


Stay

by ChrissiHR



Category: Daredevil (TV), Hawkeye (Comics), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Thor - All Media Types
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Clint Barton is Shit at Marriage Proposals, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Not Thor: Ragnarok (2017) Compliant, Thor: Ragnarok (2017) Spoilers, Tumblr Prompt, human disasters all around
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-05
Updated: 2017-12-05
Packaged: 2019-02-11 00:28:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12923406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChrissiHR/pseuds/ChrissiHR
Summary: Darcy shows up on Clint's doorstep in worse shape than Nat's ever found him in the bottom of a dumpster. Clint wants answers, but in the mean time, Pizza Dog's happy to help his hapless sidekick tend the damsel in distress.





	Stay

**Author's Note:**

  * For [phoenix_173](https://archiveofourown.org/users/phoenix_173/gifts).



> This one-shot was prompted for my 400 Follower Milestone on Tumblr by phoenix_173, who chose Darcy/Clint, One Foot by Walk The Moon.
> 
> MIND THE TAGS! THOR: RAGNAROK SPOILERS!
> 
> Beta’d by @catrinasl

 

_“Not a soul on the road_

_Not a star in the sky_

_It's a desert in my heart_

_And I know where to hide”_

_From One Foot by Walk The Moon_

* * *

 

“Darcy?”

Clint answered the door in nothing but a shoulder holster and a confused smile, but Darcy was too exhausted and sore to appreciate the view. The bag fell from her shoulder and she staggered forward.

“Darce?”

“Asgard is gone. It’s just … gone,” she whispered, sinking to her knees as the adrenaline that kept her moving forward finally dissipated and left her weak in its absence.

“Are you _bleeding_? What the hell?” Clint caught her under the arms as she collapsed, but the last thing she remembered before her vision greyed and she lost consciousness was how warm he felt, how solid and warm and steady. And here. Thank god he was here.

She woke sometime later to the sound of two voices, discussing her.

“That’s all she said?”

“Yeah,” Clint answered. “I checked the street and asked the kids to write down plate numbers of any new cars they spotted in the neighborhood. No new vehicles, but DareDevil told one of the kids he spotted what sounds an awful lot like a partial Bifrost sigil on a rooftop fifteen blocks from here. How she hoofed it fifteen blocks in this condition is beyond me, though.” Darcy felt the gentle tug as he checked the tightness around her arm—a bandage. “I’m pretty sure one of these wounds is from a sword, Tash. Something went really wrong on Asgard.”

“We’ve had no word from Thor.”

“What about Foster?” Clint queried, plucking at the medical tape holding gauze over the burn from a space Viking laser along her ribs.

“Gone. Last we heard, she was supposed to be on Asgard, too, working with their scholars. She hasn’t checked in on Earth since, so the prevailing theory has been that she’s still there, but if Lewis says Asgard is gone…”

“She was delirious, barely able to stand. Until she wakes up, I think we should proceed as if she was out of her head and not jump to conclusions.” Clint sat heavily on the floor by Darcy’s side, so she closed a hand over his shoulder to let him know she was present, if not fully capable yet of participating in the conversation. “I think she’s waking up, though. Hopefully, she’ll have some answers for us soon.”

“I’ll pass on your report to Steve. We’ll put out some feelers to a few off-world friends who might know more about how to reach Thor.”

“We have off-world friends?” Clint’s voice climbed an octave.

“No, _I_ have off-world friends.”

“That makes a weird kind of sense. Let me know what you hear.”

“Will do. Later, Barton.”

“Same, Romanoff.” Darcy heard the clatter of his smartphone as he set it on the coffee table. Then, the sofa dipped when he leaned on the cushion by her side and laid a hand on her cheek. “Come on back, Darce. You’re safe here. Talk to me, honey.”

“You haven’t called me that in a long time,” she rasped, turning her face into the familiar calloused fingers to nuzzle at him.

“Time flies. You’ve been on another planet for a few years, you know.” But she heard the relief in his voice.

“Sorry. Time passes differently when you travel by Bifrost.” She turned on her side, curling around the deep ache in her belly.

“What’s—” Clint started to ask before lunging for a trashcan to set in front of the sofa barely in time to catch her last inter-dimensional meal coming up. “Shit,” Clint cursed, fumbling for his phone. “You need a goddamn doctor.”

But everything hit Darcy at once and, overwhelmed, all she could do was lean over the trashcan full of puke and sob.

“Claire?” Clint waited a moment while the woman on the other end of the line responded, but he didn’t switch to speakerphone this time. “I’ve got an emergency. A human friend who, I think, just fell out of a portal from space. Don’t wanna move her if I don’t hafta, but—”

Clint listened carefully as Darcy sobbed over vomit-soaked, empty beer cans and pizza crusts. Clint’s trusty sidekick finally took interest in their guest and padded over to sniff at Darcy’s hair, snorting in disgust at the odor of vomit in the air.

“Sorry, buddy,” Darcy collected herself enough to apologize to Barton’s better half.

A wet washcloth appeared in her line of vision, but she didn’t move fast enough for Clint, apparently, because he started wiping her face for her and urging her to lay back against the pillows he fluffed on the sofa at her back.

“My friend, Claire, is an emergency room nurse. She won’t ask a lot of questions about a human with sword-related injuries, thank fuck, but I have all the questions, Darce, so many questions,” Clint fumed, swiping vomit from her face and hair with more force than necessary.

“I don’t know, I don’t know.” She shook her head, working herself up again, despite the knowledge that getting hysterical about it wouldn't damn well help. “I was in the Great Archive, studying Aesir law, when Sif came barreling in, followed by half a dozen Einherjar. My feet never even touched the floor; she and her men carried me off to a hidden portal in the back of the archive. I’ve read about the portals. On Asgard they call them the Ways: small tears in the barriers between realms, all made by Loki, to make passage from realm to realm easier. She said I had to go; it wasn’t safe, but the first portal led to Vanaheim, so we took another from the Imperial Palace there to a wise woman's house in the village on Asgard, but there was screaming in the village square. We couldn’t stay, so she shoved me back through and we came out on Nilfheim. The natives there don’t care for off-worlders. That’s where this came from.” She gestured to the long, cleaved open wound from a sword in her arm.

“Fuck Nilfheim,” Clint growled, rising to his feet to stalk the length of the couch a few times before stomping out of the room, only to return with a bottle of painkillers. “Arm’s probably killing you.” He shoved the bottle at her, but she couldn’t get it open.

“Sorry,” she apologized, though for what, she wasn’t sure.

“Don’t.” Clint pressed his lips together and knelt by the sofa. He opened the bottle and dumped a pair of Vicodin into his palm. “These are low dose, from when S.H.I.E.L.D. used to give a shit if I got addicted to pain pills, so I’d take two the first time, rather than chasing the pain later, trying to make it go away. Hold on, I’ll get you a—”

But he never got to finish because Lucky trotted in with a water bottle gripped gently between his teeth.

“Good boy,” Darcy crooned, giving him a few weak, but well meant pats for his trouble. “Good dog.”

Taking that as his cue to bask in his own personal awesomeness, Lucky parked his ass by the couch, wagged his tail and panted with his mouth open like he was the best good dog in the history of dogs.

“God, Barton, if I marry you, do I get the dog in the divorce?” she joked, rinsing her mouth quickly.

“If you marry me, we’ll keep a puppy from the next litter the sneaky fucker sires and you can have your own boss sidekick,” Barton promised, smoothing her hair back from her clammy face. “Scared the hell outta me, Darce.”

“Sorry.” Her lip trembled. “I got shot by an alien with a laser.”

“You win for best excuse for an injury,” Clint assured her. “Don’t ever do that to me again.”

“Sure thing,” she promised easily, “as soon as you can promise the same.”

He laughed. “No deal.”

“Well then.”

“Maybe you should marry me anyway, keep me out of trouble,” he teased.

“Sure, sure because that will absolutely work.” She tipped her face up for a kiss. “Missed you.”

“Missed you, too.” He pressed his forehead to hers and exhaled a shaky breath as he obliged, touching his lips to hers, eyes more watery than he’d ever admit. “Don’t… Just don’t scare me like that.”

“The last portal was a Bifrost observatory rigged up in a shady dwarf’s basement. Dropped me on a Brooklyn rooftop like a sack of potatoes. I’m lucky I didn’t shatter my pelvis and break my ribs when I landed. All I could think about was getting to you, one foot in front of the other.” She sniffled and kissed his nose while it was conveniently close.

“Stay this time?” he begged, shaking with worry and relief.

“Couldn’t get rid of me if you tried,” she swore.


End file.
